WEST GLENWOOD(4/9/15) – With playoff hopes all but extinguished by a 1-0 loss at Rifle on Tuesday, hope for the future was kindled two days later when freshman Davis Deaton made his varsity mound debut. The lefthander threw three no-hit innings for a 10-1 non-league win over Roaring Fork, walking only one and striking out three in making 52 pitches.
He fanned the final batter he faced, freshman mound opponent John Jensen, on a biting curve ball to end the third. Steven Romero took over in the fourth and gave up the Rams’ first hit, a single to center by Jake Kelley, and after walking the bases full, escaped the jam on a pop fly.
Ace lefthander Chase Nieslanik was victimized on a sun-ball to right that landed Raul Leyva on third base, and Jensen’s single scored the run that prevented the 10-run mercy rule from ending the game in the top of the fifth.
The Demons, held to just two hits by Rifle sophomore Takoda Cheney in dropping their league record to 2-4, exceeded that total with the first three hitters in the bottom of the first.
Keifer broken led off with a single up the middle and stole second. Ian Scruton’s single moved him to third, and Luke Ray’s grounder into right gave Glenwood a 1-0 lead. Scruton scored on a wild pitch by Jensen, and Nieslanik plated the third run of the inning with a hard hit ball past the second baseman.
Glenwood put the game away with 6 runs in the third after Jensen hit Ray to lead off the inning, walked Romero, and the bottom of the order drilled four straight hits, beginning with a double from Cooper Cornelius that scored two.
Tristan Harris’ sacrifice fly made it 10-0 in the the 4th after a single by Cornelius moved Romero to third, but the Demons’ ace lefthander couldn’t shut down the Rams in the 5th.
The Demons could’ve halted the game in the home half of the 5th or 6th with one more run, but Jensen, then Leyva set down six straight, so the game had to go the distance.
Cornelius, a sophomore, finished the final two innings, allowing just one hit and no runs.
Quinn Kimminau and Cornelius led a 10-hit Demon attack with two hits apiece.
Glenwood (3-7, 2-4 WSL) takes to the road on Saturday for a doubleheader in Steamboat Springs (3-8, 2-5).
